I’m not much of a city person, preferring to be away from its hustle and bustle, and away from too many people too, preferably in the caravan somewhere near a coast. Occasionally though, as with the Adelaide Fringe events lately, a city stay is necessary and wonderful to catch up with what’s new in the city.

For me, city visits rarely happen so I tend to pack in a lot of things to see and do while we are there, and because I’m so rarely in the ‘big smoke’ I really notice all the developments going on.

Adelaide is not a big city at all, with a population of around 1.35 million, especially when compared to Sydney at 4.9 million and Melbourne at 5.2 million, but give me Adelaide any day for ease of getting around by foot or car. The easy to follow grid layout of the city streets makes it very visitor friendly too.

 The city has a nice mix of heritage buildings that have been retained and new architecturally striking buildings. There are a number of new high-rise residential apartment towers in different parts of the city that have grown out of the ground since my last visit and with the city being surrounded by parklands, they seem like a good option for people looking for inner city living.

There is a lot of construction going on in the west end on North Terrace with cranes noticeable from afar. There have been some new medical facilities built near the Royal Adelaide Hospital precinct, including this sharp looking building.

The Adelaide Health and Medical Sciences Building is a place for students and health researchers to work together and has 14 floors an urban park and a strikingly sharp pointy design on the North Terrace side.

The South Australian Health Medical Research Institute (SAHMRI) building affectionately known as the Cheese Grater will soon have another high tech medical and research facility next door with The Australian Bragg centre (SAHMRI 2) currently being built. It will be the first proton therapy centre for cancer treatment in the southern hemisphere.

There are many examples of historic buildings along North Terrace including the Adelaide Club building which was completed in 1864 (just a drop in the ocean by European building standards) and on East Terrace as well as the East End Market buildings you can find ‘The Adelaide Electric Supply Company Limited’ building.

This was built in 1901 as a converter station for the tramway network and is typical of the architectural style for an industrial building of the time. It is comprised of rock faced limestone, red brick a granite plinth and slate.

Just a few of the interesting old and new buildings to find as you wander in Adelaide.

Cheers

Glenys